"Arise my darling" by Daniel Chuter

Arise my darling... why do you sit here?
In John 5 we see an interesting situation that deserves consideration. We see ‘impotent folk’ in verse 3, blind and lame. Sometimes if we are honest about our lives we could relate to this, spiritually speaking.  We feel helpless and in fact disabled and unable to help ourselves.  It is interesting that Jesus said that we must be poor in spirit in order to truly come to him.  This means to be utterly destitute of strength unable to be good enough in ourselves.  To be a beggar, without food or money.  To be broken and impotent, in terms of our need for salvation.

  We are living in times where it is important to be honest with God about our needs and desires.  He understands and knows our nature but we are expert at covering up and pretending.  We love the flattery and pride of appearing ‘holy’ but are really just religious and empty.  We must admit our poverty and inability to find lasting hope in life.  We just exist and get by going through routines and motions that really just make us feel better.

So the challenge is to truly except the invitation that Jesus made and to know that it truly is Him and Him alone that can help us.  So the man in this story had been in this situation for a long time.  I think if we were honest this is probably something we could all relate to.  We have been to lots of meetings and heard lots about what God might be like but do we really cry out to Him, who alone can heal.
In this story it was believed that if a certain event occurred, verse 4, a man could be healed.  But the man was always stopped and delayed.  Do we often find that what we really want doesn’t really happen?  So the real question is... what do we really believe... what have we been told?  What are our convictions based upon?  What do we dwell on and put our trust in?

In the Garden of Eden the first lie was about whether God had really established a truth.  We are led to doubt and question and be afraid.  So do we believe the whole truth?  That Jesus died for us and was in fact raised that we may ‘walk forward’. If we follow the story we see that Jesus turned up and perceived the true problem; the truth is that we need forgiveness otherwise we carry a sense of guilt, condemnation and shame for a lifetime.  The truth is that Jesus is love and desires only to help and bless.  The truth is that we don’t have to sit in our lives just existing and getting by. Jesus said that we should continue in His word and that we would know the truth and that it would set us free.

We live in a land and a time full of different ideas and voices.  Even our churches can be full of lots of ideas and views.  But are there also not strongholds that are set up against the knowledge of God.  In that way we dwell in an enemy occupied land in the same way that Gideon did, because the people had turned from God and the Midianites had been allowed access, Judges 6.

Jesus offers us Life to the full. Surely we must dismantle much of our self righteousness for there is only one who can truly forgive?  So let us be honest... we need Him.

"SPIRITUAL GPS" by Moya Boardman

To get where you are going you first need to know where you are - seems simple but although we may apply it when we are driving we don’t always apply it anywhere else. At the start of the year I knew I needed to look at improving my health & losing weight but I’d put off getting any sort of medical assessment trying to avoid hearing anything bad. I had a few blood tests which indicated that I had a poorly functioning thyroid and may be verging on diabetes. I was initially disappointed; I didn’t want to hear that, I felt a failure that God was failing me.

However I had a choice - I could stay feeling like that and go into a pity party. I could carry on ignoring my health or do something with the knowledge. I chose to do something with it because I wanted to get to the place of being healthier. It hasn’t been easy but knowing where I was did motivate me to keep going and I have lost weight, I’m slowly improving.

In our lives with God we often get those prophetic words telling us about the plan He has for us, I’ve heard it described as God taking a slice of our future and bringing it into the present to show us the way ahead. He sees us as we can be. However hearing it does not make us that person - there is a process to go through. The starting point is to allow God to show you where you are and what needs to change to enable you to go forward. It seems incredible but many times we do not want to hear the things about ourselves because of shame, pride, wounding. We actually make a choice not to hear sometimes.
It takes courage to hear God say things like “we are feeling sorry for ourselves & complaining about other people” - we don’t want to allow Him to show us the wound and let Him bring healing. We’d rather stay in our own self deception of “I’m OK everyone else is insensitive”. People’s actions can cause deep pain to surface in us but the only person responsible for healing the wounded place is the person who has the wound. If the person acted intentionally then they are responsible for their action and need to be responded to (not reacted to) informed of what they have done & proper boundaries put in place. If however they have not intentionally done anything but you feel a reaction of being ignored/abandoned/etc that is a sign to look closer.

Only when you have heard God for yourself in that place can you get the healing. You can’t deal with this by self control - that’s like putting a plaster on a broken leg. You have to open up to the Holy Spirit and hear the word which brings freedom. Go to your pastor, leader or a mature friend who hears God and pray it through.

The other thing is if you have not progressed in healing over a number of years you need to go back to God again with your pastor or leader. Go determined to hear & RECEIVE what God is saying to you. “It was for freedom that Christ has set us free” Galatians 5.1, “By His stripes we are healed” 1 Peter 2.24, “He bore our sorrows” Isaiah 53.5  are not just nice words. Either they are true or what’s the point? Don’t judge God’s truth by your fact, truth is the higher power.

There is an anointing on God’s chosen leaders that is for our benefit, don’t fall into the ditch of isolating, after a while it’s really hard to get out of. God always wants the best for us - do we want the best for ourselves and are we willing to make the choices, sometimes difficult, to get where we are going?